Home > News & Events > News > OGEL Call for Papers: Special Issue on "Social Licence to Operate (SLO) in the Extractive and Energy Sectors"

OGEL Call for Papers: Special Issue on "Social Licence to Operate (SLO) in the Extractive and Energy Sectors"

3 July 2018

Dr. Jędrzej Górski, Dr. Gokce Mete, and Hon. Christine Trenorden will be editing a Special Issue of Oil, Gas & Energy Law (OGEL, ISSN 1875-418X, www.ogel.org)
on the legal aspects of the "Social Licence to Operate (SLO) in the Extractive and Energy Sectors".

The concept of social licence to operate (SLO, simply 'social license' or 'social
licensing') originated in the mining industry and its use has also been
extended over large infrastructure, energy, and industrial projects. In simple
terms, the SLO refers to: 1) "the ongoing acceptance of a company or industry's
standard business practices and operating procedures by its employees,
stakeholders and the general public" (Investopedia 2018) and 2) "the level of
acceptance or approval by local communities and stakeholders of mining
companies and their operations." (Fraser Institute 2012). Specifically in the mining
sector, the SLO can be summarised as attempts to "to secure the acceptance of
mining activities by local communities and stakeholders, in order to build
public trust in their activities and prevent social conflict" (IRP UNEP 2017)
whereas such attempts "are premised on engagement between mining companies,
governments and civil society to ensure that mineral resource extraction
contributes to nation-al and local development, and that damaging impacts on
host communities and the environment are mitigated or otherwise managed"
(ibid.).

The need of the developers/investors to obtain the SLO stems from the "the demands
on and expectations for a business enterprise that emerge from neighbourhoods,
environmental groups, community members, and other elements of the surrounding
civil society" (Gunningham, Kagan, Thornton 2014). In turn, from the
perspective of developers/investors, the SLO is "a pragmatic calculation
of what is required to minimise business risk and win the degree of community
support required to avoid delay or disruption to company operations" (Owen, Kemp 2013).
The SLO is based on some agreement between developers/investors and stakeholders/the
community and can take a form of 1) "an informal agreement that infers ongoing
acceptance of an industrial or energy project by a local community and the
stakeholders affected by it" (Gallois, Ashworth, Leach, Moffat 2017) or 2) "a form of unwritten social
contract that exists between companies and communities" (Lacey, Lamont 2014)

The lawmakers can assist with the development of agreements for SLO through
procedural empowerment of various stakeholders such as by securing 1) access to
environmental information, 2) public participation in environmental law making,
strategic impact assessment (SEA) or project-specific environmental impact assessment
(EIA), and 3) related administrative and judicial review procedures. Moreover,
within the framework of sector-specific corporate-social-responsibility (CSR)/
Triple Bottom Line (TBL) activities, developers/investors also seek to secure
wider SLO going beyond pure compliance for a number of reasons such as a desire
to avoid boycott, or a belief that downplaying such expectations would
eventually lead to the adoption of stricter regulation (Gunningham, Kagan,
Thornton 2014). Indeed, to quote Curran, "[i]n an
age of CSR, social licence thus acts as a form of strategic risk management for
most major companies. Its objective is to protect companies' financial and
reputational assets by proactively anticipating and managing contestation
rather than simply reacting to it." (2017).

Obtaining SLO in relation to the extraction of
hydrocarbons and electricity generation is more relevant than ever. On the
global scale, the public awareness concerning the impact of new investments and
ongoing operations in those sectors on the environment, climate and quality of
life of affected communities is constantly increasing, whereas we remain as far
as ever from phasing out conventional fuels. About 1600 new coal power plants
(CPP) and about 50 nuclear power (NPP) are currently planned or being
constructed.

The co-editors invite you to explore the legal dimensions of the controversy surrounding the
SLO by contributing to this special edition with unpublished or previously
published articles, conference papers, research papers and case studies
addressing the SLO and corresponding issues.

The following topics raise interesting points for discussion of the SLO:

sub-regional MDBs: Caribbean Development Bank (CDB); Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI); East African Development Bank (EADB); West African Development Bank (BOAD); Black Sea Trade and Development Bank (BSTDB); Economic Cooperation Organization Trade and Development Bank (ETDB); Eurasian Development Bank (EDB); New Development Bank (NDB); OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID);

national development banks/agencies of major donors: Australia: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (Development Cooperation Division); Canada: Global Affairs Canada and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC); China: International Development Cooperation Agency; Denmark - Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA); European Union: EuropeAid department of the European Commission; France: Agence Française de Développement (AfD); Germany - Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW); Italy: Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Italian Development Cooperation Programme; Korea: International Cooperation Agency (KOICA); Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC); Netherlands: Ministry of Development Cooperation and The Netherlands Foreign Trade and Development Agency (NFTDA); Norway: Ministry of Foreign Affairs: International Development Program[28] and Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD); Russia: Federal Agency for the Commonwealth of Independent States; Switzerland: Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC): Sweden; International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida); United Kingdom: Department for International Development (DFID); United States: Agency for International Development (USAID);

Papers should be sent by 31 March 2019. Articles
accepted for publication ahead of this schedule can also go through OGEL's
on-line advance publication process allowing your work reach its target
audience as soon as the paper completes peer review and editing process.

Articles and short articles can be submitted. The minimum word count of articles should
be 5,000 words (4,500 words excluding footnotes, endnotes, appendices, tables,
summary etc). The maximum word count of articles should be 9,000 words (10,000
words including footnotes, endnotes, appendices, tables, summary etc. Longer
contributions can be considered for publication on exceptional basis. Contributors
might be asked to cross-review up to two other papers.

Citation style, with emphasis on internet sources, should strictly conform to the 4th
edn of the Oxford University Standard for the Citation of Legal Authorities
(OSCOLA) along with the 'OSCOLA 2006 Citing International Law Sources Section'[1]. The layout of the articles should conform to OGEL's submission
guidelines available at: www.ogel.org/contribute.asp (more information available upon request)

Feel free to circulate this call for papers amongst friends, colleagues and other people who you think may have an interest in this topic.